In the summer, West Virginia University is not nearly as crowded with students as during the regular school year, which is why the school chose this period to finish a majority of the construction work completed on the renovation project at the Evansdale campus. In June 2011, university officials announced a $160 million project to renovate and replace old buildings on the grounds, according to The Charleston Daily Mail. The plan is to update older facilities to provide more space for students and spread the school's population out a bit to ease traffic congestion around the main campus.

The numbers are in for the construction industry progress during the month of July, and new-home construction is down, but industry experts don't believe this bodes poorly for the future. The Commerce Department is reporting that new home starts are down 1.1 percent from an annual rate of 754,000 in June to 746,000 in July, according to the Financial Times. The number of constructions jobs that got underway last month may have been less than expected, but this decline is not much to worry about, as new home starts rose 6.8 percent from May to June. The slight decline is more of a sign of the market stabilizing than a cause for concern.

Children in Marblehead, Mass., will soon be attending classes in an all-new, state-of-the-art facility. Glover Elementary was recently torn down to make room for a brand new building. Earlier this month, demolition crews used backhoes, excavators and other construction equipment to take down two buildings that had housed K-3 education since 1916 and 1948, according to WickedLocal.com.

Many people rely on the Mississippi River as their main source of drinking water, but salt water from the Gulf of Mexico is leaking into the river and contaminating it. In order to protect the water supply, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is constructing an underwater defense mechanism known as a sill, according to Fox 8 WVUE-TV in New Orleans. Drought issues in the South have caused many problems, including low river levels. This in turn has resulted in salt water from the Gulf streaming into the river and making the water unfit to drink for residents of the Plaquemines Parish in Louisiana.

Interstate-95, which runs along the East Coast, has been crowded with more than just everyday traffic, as drivers have likely seen excavators, cement mixers and other construction equipment in a few areas along the highway. The latest project to get underway is taking place on a 29-mile stretch of I-95 near Washington, D.C., where construction workers will be adding express lanes to the highway between Virginia's Garrisonville Road in Stafford County and Edsall Road in Fairfax County, according to Fairfax News.

Across the nation, construction companies are seeing more work, which means jobs are being created and construction equipment - such as backhoes, excavators and cranes - is being purchased. Some areas of the country are doing better than others, and Florida is one of the states experiencing a boom in the construction industry.

New legislation in the state of New Hampshire is about to go into effect, and public schools will be required to plead their case when they need construction work done on their learning facilities. Until now, the state government approved all requests for construction aid, as there have been no limits on this budget since 1955, The Associated Press reports.

Harnessing the wind to create usable energy has been a growing industry in recent years, and BP Wind Energy plans to expand its operations by building a new wind turbine farm in Wyoming County, Pa., with the help of Sempra U.S. Gas and Power. Marketwatch reported that early in July, BP was planning to invest $8 billion globally in the next 10 years to developing alternative energy resources, but will likely reach this goal by the end of the year. BP has already invested $4 billion in the U.S., and another $3 billion around the world.

By next year, Mobile County, Ala., is expecting to complete a number of construction projects that will improve and add to the region's public school system. The Mobile Press-Register reports several new schools are being built this year and other buildings are receiving major renovations. Overall, the projects will cost roughly $100 million.

Construction on the $368 million L'Auberge Casino and Hotel in Baton Rouge, La., may take a bit longer than expected. Pinnacle Entertainment Inc. recently approached the state's Gambling Control Board for a one-month extension on the project, according to local news network WBRZ.